Angela's Business Part 16

And then, becoming aware of a teacher hovering about in the corridor near the door,--a fellow named Hartwell it was, who had long seemed rather attentive to Mary,--Charles Garrott rose to go, a mere polite caller.

"Isn't it time you were knocking off?"

"I think I'd better clear up a little more of this, now that I'm at it."

"I wonder if I couldn't help you with some of that?"

"Oh, no, thank you." (Why, of course he couldn't help HER, even to tear up old papers.) "n.o.body could understand it but me. But I've--appreciated your visit."

He wished her a good-afternoon. In a stately silence, he traversed the s.p.a.cious corridor, stalked down the handsome stairways. For the moment, he could not get his thought back to the concrete; the sting of defeat possessed him, the bitterness that is the portion of the friend of women. And then, in this mood, shaking the dust of the High School from his feet, he encountered, of all inopportune people under the sun, Miss Flora Trevenna.

He came upon the unhappy girl standing in a corner of the outer vestibule, beyond the great bronze doors; she stood alone, looking off down the twilight street. Her head turned at the sound of Charles's feet; recognition came hesitatingly into her glance, and she bowed, smiling remotely in the absent or reserved way which seemed to be characteristic of her. It was clearly on a second thought that she spoke suddenly, in her fluty voice:--

"Oh!--could you tell me whether Miss Wing is still in the building?"

Pausing, his hat stiffly raised, the young man said that Miss Wing was.

"You'll find her in her office--on the third floor at the front, you know."

"Thank you."

But, as he bowed and pa.s.sed on, the Badwoman made no move to enter and ascend. She stood as he had found her, waiting, aside: a solitary and withdrawn figure, for the moment to the perceiving eye not untouched with pathos.

But Charles, proceeding, could see in this figure only the witting cause of all the trouble. He had spoken kindly enough to Miss Trevenna: now suddenly all his acc.u.mulated and complex resentment seemed to gather and pour out. Couldn't the woman leave Mary alone, even on this day? But no--of course she couldn't! She who had claimed her Happiness over her mother's heart would see nothing amiss in seeking to scramble back to good repute by the same general route. It was her Higher Law to throw her blight over all who might a.s.sist her: over her friend, Mary Wing, no more than over her own young sisters, from whom (Judge Blenso said) people were already silently dropping away, now that it was known that the "free" Miss Flora came sometimes to the house.

_Free!..._ Was not here, indeed, that underside of "Freedom," that true reverse of Taking My Happiness, which the New speakers never mentioned?

This girl conceived freedom just as a Developed Ego would conceive it, as an order of things in which she should be "free," while everyone else, going on as usual, sacrificed and denied to uphold her comfort and support her illimitable selfishness. In her goings out and comings in, she would take no thought but for her Self. And there she stood, no leader of a new dawn, but a true enemy of the common good: a female Anti-Social, a lawless Egoette, who maintained that the world was ordered and the sun set in the heavens, that she only might indulge herself where her whim led....

On the corner the young man halted, shook himself slightly, and glanced up and down. A brief anxiousness crossed his face, followed by an air of irresolution.

This street, Albemarle, was three blocks from Was.h.i.+ngton, and certainly not a street that a pleasure-walker, like Miss Angela, would be likely to pick out. Charles's legs seemed to thirst for exercise. But it was clear to him that it would not do to run any superfluous risks; especially just now, when it was all so fresh and new. Therefore, after a moment of struggle, the authority once more set his face ingloriously toward the street-cars.

And as he went he began to think again, more intently than he had thought in all the thoughtful day. He had taken that challenge of Mary's full in the face, as it were. She had said, as if in final summary of their relations, that he was incapable of helping her. Very well; he had a clear field now to show her, once and for all, whether or not that was true.

That third plan of his (of which she should hear no inkling now till the thing was done) was nothing less than to roll up such a body of Public Opinion as would overwhelm the School Board--a body somewhat sensitive to Opinion--forcing it to reverse itself. This could not be done in a day, of course. To gather momentum enough to rouse the local papers would mean to start far back. So Charles's mind had fastened at once on his old idea of a thoroughgoing eulogistic "write-up" of Mary, to begin with, in some national magazine of the highest standing. Only now his soaring ambition was to "plant" three such write-ups at least--cunningly differentiated in matter and manner, and signed with different names.

Nor did this seem by any means a dream. From the periodicals themselves, he saw that there was a demand for just such "stuff" nowadays, just such little smartly-written sketches of "people who were doing things." Mary did things, without a doubt. And once he got the write-ups in print,--even two write-ups, or one,--he had a powerful bludgeon to swing at the local editors. "Look here," he would say to them, "why do we have to go away from home to learn the news? Are you fellows going to sit still and say nothing while some live city gets this woman for Superintendent of Schools? Why don't you ..."

The imaginary exhortation ended there. Round the corner ahead of Charles a man came swinging just then, rapidly drawing near. And all small plottings were catapulted from the mind of Mary's friend as he looked into the face of Mr. Mysinger.

The princ.i.p.al of the High School approached with a native swagger, on much "s.h.i.+ned" shoes. He was what is called a careful dresser; a heavily built man, fair and not ill-looking. Ten steps away, his eye fell on Charles, and, while his lips a.s.sumed a gracious smile, the eye in question seemed to lighten with a flash of triumph. And the sight of Miss Trevenna was nothing to that sight. All the blood in the young man's body seemed suddenly to be pounding in his head.

"Well, Garrott! How goes it to-day?"

It had not occurred to him to "cut" Mysinger, but so the matter seemed to be written in the stars. In silence, the pa.s.sing author looked the princ.i.p.al through and through. And his head grew hotter, and the pit of his stomach icier, as he saw Mysinger's smile become fixed, saw it waver doubtfully and die, saw open hostility slide into the hated eye. So Mary Wing's conqueror and her unhelpful friend went by at half a foot.

"By George! I'll beat up that rascal yet for this!"

The unliterary words were ejected, it seemed, by a demon within. But no sooner had they fallen on the ear of Charles than all the rest of him leapt upon and seized them, as one recognizing a long-felt want, an unconquerable need. And thus his writer's imagination was off upon yet another plan, the last and the best.

Yes, that was what he wanted, needed now, more than anything else. He would humiliate this swaggering Teuton past all endurance; he would go and kick him till his weary legs refused the office; he would batter him till his own wife pa.s.sed him by for a stranger. Lord, what a plan! And then, the moment he could leave the hospital, Mysinger would crawl around to Olive Street, hat in hand. "Miss Wing, I'm pet.i.tioning the Board to invite you back to the High School at once," he would say. "I humbly beg you to come, and try to forgive me for my contemptible conduct in the past. I don't know why I've always acted like such a dirty dog" (Mysinger would say). "It's just my low, base nature, I guess." And Mary, starting up in surprise (but, perhaps, already half-suspecting the truth), would say: "But this is astounding, Mr.

Mysinger! How come you here, saying these things to me?" And that insolent fellow, whiter than death, would mumble through swollen lips, "It's Mr. Garrott's orders, miss."

_Then_ Mary would, perhaps, understand a little better whether or not a _man_ could help her....

The author turned suddenly on the darkling street, moved by an instinct to look after his retiring enemy. By an odd coincidence, Princ.i.p.al Mysinger had been moved by an instinct to turn and look after him, Charles. Both men turned hastily round again.

So Charles, halting on the corner for his car, shook himself once again, reined in his imagination, and remembered that he was a modern and civilized being. For the moment, the reminder seemed to accomplish little. The blood continued to pound in the sedentary temples, redly.

Charles saw that the idea of primitive male combat, over a manly woman's Career, was unmodern and grotesque. But the idea lingered all the same.

He spent the evening upon the first of his write-ups, scenarios shut fast in the drawer. This piece concerned Mary Wing the Educator, and the intention was to have Mary's friend, Hartwell, read, sign, and father it. Every precaution must be taken, of course, to give the whole thing a spontaneous air, avoiding the appearance of a concerted boom. By midnight, the first draft of the Educator write-up was finished, and, wearied, the young man picked up the "Post," where he had had eyes but for one story that morning.

Here his wandering glance fell presently upon this:--

Miss Angela Flower entertained at bridge last evening at the residence of her parents, Dr. and Mrs. Oscar P. Flower. Miss Flower's guests included a limited number of the younger set.

At this description of himself and f.a.n.n.y, Charles smiled, for almost the first time that day. But as he continued to gaze at that small hopeful item, his mirth faded, and soon he began to stroke the bridge of his nose, his look distinctly worried.

X

In the little house of the Flowers, Miss Angela sat forlorn at her favorite post. She entertained the younger set no more. It was the middle of December, and a cold rain poured. With a ragged bit of chamois, the old-fas.h.i.+oned girl polished her already comely nails. The window-curtain, shrunken and twisted with more than one was.h.i.+ng, was hooked back on a convenient nail; now and then Angela picked up her shabby opera-gla.s.ses and peeped over into the fan-shaped sliver of Was.h.i.+ngton Street. But few pedestrians pa.s.sed over there to-day, and the motor-cars of the Blessed slid by in curtains of waterproof.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ANGELA PEEPED OVER INTO WAs.h.i.+NGTON STREET]

It was the slack hour again, it seemed, leaving home-makers with idle hands. Even that subtle business to which but one modern authority gave a scientific rating, the Business of Supplying Beauty and Supplying Charm, was here at a complete standstill. The men of Angela's family, who must be refreshed and made joyful for their battlings in the world without, were at this hour out, battling. Mrs. Flower was lying down in her room, doing her own refres.h.i.+ng. As for the cook downstairs, she had her orders, and recked not of Charm. Angela, thus, had her strictly earned leisure; and, on the other hand, she had not those intenser occupations for leisure, reforms, fights, and attacks on Morals, such as engrossed the mind of her advanced Cousin Mary. As a womanly woman, she naturally thought a great deal about people, her friends, and as an una.s.sisted stranger in the city, she really had very few friends to think about. Hence, it was the most natural thing imaginable if she was now wondering, for the thousandth time, what in the world had become of Mr. Garrott.

Angela could not understand about Mr. Garrott. He simply never seemed to walk any more. That she had hurt his feelings very badly that night after the bridge-party she had understood, from the start. But perhaps she had never meant to hurt them so badly as this; and that Mr. Garrott could vanish utterly from Was.h.i.+ngton Street had, indeed, not entered her thoughts. This, however, was precisely what Mr. Garrott had done, from the very day following the misunderstanding.

For so, in the lapse of days, had Angela generously come to think of the occurrence on the sofa. She and Mr. Garrott had had a terrible misunderstanding.

It was half-past four o'clock; the dreary day was shutting in. Angela looked down into her own back yard, which was small, mean-looking, not devoid of tin cans, and now running with dirty water. A dingy old shed or outhouse, where some previous tenant had thriftily stabled a horse, contributed not a little to the wintry desolateness of the scene.

Beneath the window the cook, Luemma, emerged, a ragged print-skirt turned over her head, and emptied ashes into a broken wooden barrel.

Angela yawned, and picked up a hand-gla.s.s.

The girl's more kindly view of Mr. Garrott's demeanor had been, of course, a gradual growth. Her mortification and rage against the young tribute-payer had lasted two days, at least, and chancing to see her poor Cousin Mary at this time,--who was now being talked about from one end of the town to the other,--she had taken occasion to speak most disparagingly of Mr. Garrott, though, of course, in an indirect manner.

She had described him as a person of the _lowest ideals_. At this Cousin Mary had protested, quite indignantly; and, though Angela well knew there were phases of Mr. Garrott which her mannish cousin was not likely ever to see, that stout champions.h.i.+p had doubtless done much to check her first resentment and make her see things in a truer light. Moreover, she was naturally a sweet-tempered creature, and the long days following, and the long empty walks, may have been just the things needed to appeal most subtly to her higher nature. After all, Mr.

Garrott had been remarkably nice to her, paying her every attention from the beginning. And even if he _had_ been carried away, for once--what did that show ...

A ring at the doorbell made Angela jump a little. While the Flowers had a small house, they had a loud bell. Though its clanging nowadays rarely meant anything exciting, the diversion, on the whole, was not unwelcome.

The young housekeeper rose, went out into the hall, and listened down over the banisters.

Below, there was nothing to listen to. Receiving only twelve dollars a month, Luemma seemed to think she must take out the residue of her wages in inefficience and impudence, and did; sometimes she answered the bell, sometimes she "had her hands in the lightbread," etc. The present seemed to be one of the latter times. The bell pealed again; a voice from the front called, "Angela!--are you dressed?"--and Angela, replying to her mother, went down to the door herself, smoothing her hair and tr.i.m.m.i.n.g her waist as she went.

The caller proved to be none other than her disgraced cousin, Mary Wing.